About book Light Action In The Caribbean: Stories (2001)
Barry Lopez's stories are wonderfully delicate. Not in the sense of being soft or sentimental or flowery, but its like they have a highly textured and fragile surface. The characters in his stories recognize that their life, all their hopes and dreams, depends upon the careful balance of this surface and the lightness of their tread upon it, and they are drawn into a profound respect, and deep reverence for its harmony. In this way his stories are usually heading toward the intersection of the physical and the spiritual. I like the ways his characters are seeking, the intentionality with which they move. For this reason, the title story comes as an extra shock. It follows the trajectory of characters heading the opposite way, a direction he does not usually go. And because of this the story was so profound and unsettling. A worthwhile read, and really works as a counterpoint to the Flannery O'Connor book of essays I just read, and the different ways that authors use violence. I would like to listen to a conversation between them.
My good friend Paul recommended this book to me. Because he described Barry Lopez as a naturalist writer I initially expected this book to be completely non-fictional. Boy was I wrong! After getting involved in the stories I was shocked at the supernatural twists and turns they took. However, once I got used to this unexpected formula I found that I really enjoyed the stories. They possess a character and flair that I don't think I've ever seen before. The stories were very captivating. A couple of them were a bit slow, but still pretty interesting. I actually read this book while in the Eastern Caribbean. I found that my unusual setting added to the spirit of the stories. My favorite story in the book was Emory Bear Hands' Birds. So fascinating!
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These stories are all perfectly crafted gems of communication. Lopez makes each one a vessel to bear a particular insight, one of his seemingly vast store of wisdom-objects. The stories are all 'slices of a life' as my love would call, them, but yet they are never boring. Rather than focus on lives as we have become habituated to them, he brings out the deep nature of lives we all know to be there. His characters are laconic and flawed, but each understands something truly crucial about life. The situations Lopez places them in deftly illustrate the crux of their insight. Barry Lopez endlessly and artfully articulates wisdoms gained from a lifetime spent perceiving and understanding, listening to the things he was told by places and communities. He has gathered a treasure trove of intuition and knowledge of the human condition and of the particular way we live in our particular world. His works are not to be missed by anyone of your generation.
—Adam
